Yet all the while, President Donald Trump was calling for Lisa Cook to quit. She is a member of the U.S. Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors and had just been accused of serious mortgage fraud. This latest demand follows a call from Bill Pulte, director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), for the Department of Justice to investigate Cook. Specifically, he alleged that Cook had falsely claimed residence exemptions for homes in Ann Arbor, Michigan and Atlanta, Georgia.
If true, the allegations suggest that Cook could have engaged in chicanery. This would have been critical to obtaining lower interest rates and better loan terms. Pulte has gone so far as to assert that Cook “falsified bank documents and property records to acquire more favorable loan terms, potentially committing mortgage fraud.”
Trump demanded that Cook resign and posted his demand on Truth Social. He even connected the post to a Bloomberg report that laid out all the allegations in full detail. He provocatively stated, “Lisa Cooked is cooked,” highlighting his discontent with her actions and the implications for the Federal Reserve.
The controversy quickly escalated when Pulte directly started calling out Federal Reserve policies. He bravely defended Trump’s coup against Cook and Jerome Powell, chair of the Fed. Pulte further stated that Powell needs to look into the allegations made against Cook. If he fails to act, he becomes complicit to her alleged misconduct. In one such letter on August 15, he called attention to discriminatory mortgage documents that the FHFA recently acquired. These filings seem to strengthen his allegations against Cook.
Lisa Cook speaking at a Federal Reserve listening session on monetary policy. Perhaps most telling of her views, though, is how she voted most recently with the Fed’s majority on the Federal Open Market Committee to hold interest rates steady following last month’s meeting. Her presence in these conversations really helps to highlight the potential repercussions for allegations like these. This would be a major blow to her influence inside the Federal Reserve.
On June 25, 2025, Cook participated in a collective open meeting of the Federal Reserve Board in Washington, D.C. The main topic of conversation was revisions the board proposed to its supplementary leverage ratio standards. The intense scrutiny of her actions puts her position in jeopardy. It uncovers a more extensive campaign by Trump and his cronies to shove the Federal Reserve’s hand on the policy lever to drop interest rates.